Angela Merkel rebukes successor for alliance with far-right AfD on anti-immigration motion
Angela Merkel rebukes successor for alliance with far-right AfD on anti-immigration motion
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Merkel made the rare public statement criticising the CDU leader, Friedrich Merz, for breaking a ‘firewall’ in the Bundestag vote. Former German chancellor Angela Merkel has criticised Friedrich Merz, her successor as leader of the country’s conservatives, for pushing through proposals on migration and asylum with the backing of the far-right AfD.
In a rare intervention in public affairs since stepping down from politics in December 2021, Merkel said that Merz, who is tipped to become Germany’s next chancellor, had in effect performed a U-turn. On her website, she wrote that Merz, head of the centre-right CDU/CSU alliance, had said in a speech last November that he was against passing policies with the support of the generally shunned AfD, even it was by “accident”.
She said she stood by the longstanding conviction that there should never be any association between the mainstream parties and the AfD. “I think it is wrong to no longer feel bound to this proposal, thereby allowing a majority with the votes of the AfD in a vote in the German Bundestag for the first time on 29 January 2025,” she added.
Wednesday’s vote was unprecedented. For the first time the AfD, second in polls ahead of the election on 23 February, was instrumental in helping a mainstream party towards a parliamentary majority. The pro-business FDP also contributed to the motion’s success.
